Q. I have a little problem with my horse. My uncle is a veterinarian. He knows the behavior happens in other horses, too. He suggested that I tell you about the problem and see if you have ever seen such a rude habit and if you know whether it can be fixed.

This is the situation. My horse lives at a stable for old horses, not at our house. Our family has adopted him and pays for his care, and we go there to see him and groom him once or twice a week. I can ride him a little, but mostly I just visit him. It’s really hard for me to explain, but this is what he does.

Whenever I take friends there to show him to them, he really tries to embarrass me and gross them out. What he does is trot right up to the fence as soon as we pull in (or to the front of the stall if he is in the barn) like he is really friendly and excited to see us. He loves carrots and kisses and pats on his nose. If you wiggle his whiskers, he does that laughing thing with his nose, like Mr. Ed. After a few minutes, he sorta gets bored and turns away a bit, always stands sideways to me and my friends, and does something really weird. First, he looks like he is going to go to the bathroom, but he doesn’t really do that. He just “flashes” us. He waves his “thing” back and forth. It gets bigger and bigger, especially at the end. Then my friends say really wise comments about it and about him. Some people think it’s really gross. Last Saturday, my older cousin said we should not look at it. She made everyone go over to the goats and chickens.

Why is he trying to do this to me? He doesn’t do it when I go there alone, just every time he sees my friends. Once, when I rode him over to my one friend’s house and stopped to talk to her brother and some other boys, my horse “flashed” them. The same thing happened. He was nice to them at first, then he stepped away and stood where they could see him. They laughed and started pushing each other around and scared him, and he stopped. My friend’s parents came over to check it out. Next, my horse did it to them. My friend’s mom asked me if that thing can be removed. To make it even worse, when he was starting up again, he popped them a woofy. Mom says I don’t need to tell you or anyone else what my friend’s father said that woofy meant